Plant Imaging Consortium Conducts Teacher Training
Participants in the Plant Imaging Consortium's teaching training workshop
7/24/2015
JONESBORO – The Plant Imaging Consortium (PIC) held its first Mutant Millets teacher training workshop this week at the Arkansas Biosciences Institute, Arkansas State University.
PIC provided the training and supplies necessary for 10 high school teachers in Arkansas to implement this citizen science project into their classrooms for the upcoming academic year.
The Mutant Millets teaching module, developed at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in St. Louis, utilizes the plant Setaria viridis (green foxtail) as a model organism for studying genetic mutations in row crops such as corn and sorghum.
During the three-year project, science students will grow and record individual plant characteristics then directly report their findings to researchers in Arkansas and Missouri. The data collected by the students will have a direct impact on future research in economically important crops grown in the Delta region.
Shea Harris, education outreach coordinator, and Dr. Argelia Lorence, professor of metabolic engineering, led the workshop in Northeast Arkansas in coordination with Julie Grady, director of the Rural STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) Center.
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